Constabulary to create framework lasting five years and hoped to ‘accelerate the delivery of technology and data products to frontline officers and establish new ways of working and rapid prototyping’
London’s Metropolitan Police Service has revealed plans to put in place a £25m “dynamic market” to enable the deployment of digital, data and artificial intelligence tools to support the force in delivering “precise policing”.
A newly published commercial planning notice outlines that the procurement arrangement “is being established to accelerate how the Metropolitan Police delivers technology and data products to frontline officers”.
The agreement, dubbed ‘Precise Policing Phase 2’, will feature a single lot covering products and services across a handful of defined areas, beginning with professional services “such as software development, testing and data engineering”.
Also covered by the deal will be “transformation and automation” offerings, including “AI- and data-enabled products and services including agentic AI, video processing, workflow and business process modelling”.
The marketplace will encompass “digital workplace modernisation” tools to help address areas such as legacy upgrades, as well as data management, and cybersecurity tools.
The area of “video processing and analysis”, meanwhile, will include tools that enable “searching using technology such as AI to identify and detect objects”, according to the notice.
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The five-year agreement is expected to open for bids in September and come into effect by the end of the year. During its first 18 months in operation, the force expects that its needs for specific tech use-cases will include: “video redaction; situational awareness; video searching; data intelligence/intel scanning…; public order planning; [and] digital asset management… and improvements to end-to-end digital processes”.
The marketplace, which is forecast to be worth £25m to the chosen suppliers, “will establish and bring together a new delivery model, procurement framework, ways of working and rapid prototyping, to work on a series of prioritised initiatives” for policing in the capital. The agreement will help the Met “meet current and future operational needs” while realising the objectives of a “transformative change programme” envisioned by the force’s commissioner Mark Rowley, the planning notice says.
The new framework is further intended to help progress the London force’s Digital, Data and Technology Strategy, which is built on six core themes: foundations; data; transformation; efficiency and resiliency; capabilities; and ways of working.
As its headline name suggests, the market will also help to enable “precise policing” – wherein investigative and enforcement resources are targeted based on data and analysis.
Ahead of inviting bids for a place on the market, the Met has already worked with techUK to deliver a market engagement webinar – the presentation from which can be made available, on request, to prospective providers.
